A bruised reed shall he not break, and smoking flax shall he not quench

[pekefosch]

For some time I am owner of a Cybook Gen3. I am absolutely glad to have it! It has incredible battery duration and is lightweight and very brillant.

I hear a lot of negative statements about the device and need to correct some things.

1. As intermediate media between conventional PC and paper book it doesn't need to be lighed. There is light almost everywhere! You better have 8000 page turns than plugging the power supply every five hours

2. Error handling: I installed some ttf fonts and chose one of them as displaying font. After deleting the fonts you get some error but after deleting the configuration file (no "hard reset" neccessary) anything is working again.

3. Compatibility is nearly perfect, some pdfs need to be "reflowed" but this belongs to pdf standards

4. Pricing is fantastic

5. Documentation is really worse and firmware information is worse, too, but there are so many negative reviews I have seen and I cannot understand. As information technology professional I have to say: Good work, some improvements would be fine, but reviews with 1/5, 2/5, or 3/5 that is not authentic. E.g. I read some professional review with "battery life "3-4/5" but it is indeed 5/5!! It seems that there are loyalists for any ebook reader platform destroying the smart work of others, before ebook readers even get really public. Bookeen did a fine job and the Cybook gen3 has really great usability. Most happy owners have no reason for discussing and mostly minor faults are widely discussed.

I would egerly spend 4-5/5. I cannot find major disadvantages between Sony, Bebook and Bookeen at all.

Let the technology spread before it is terminated.

[desertgrandma]

Welcome to MobileRead, pekefosch.


You've brought up some great points, and I hope you stick around and join in on some threads.

Let us know where you are from and what you like to read, and be sure to download some of the free books we have here.

Click on the 'e-book' tab....

[tompe]

Originally Posted by pekefosch

E.g. I read some professional review with "battery life "3-4/5" but it is indeed 5/5!!

The battery life is very bad compared to other E-ink readers so I really think that 3/5 is to high. The battery life is 3-4 days (with instant access) for the Cybook. The Bebook's battery time is measured in weeks (with instant access).

[benham]

What size is Bebook (in inches) and is it available in US?

[Abelturd]

Bebook has a 6" screen just like cybook. In US it's sold under the brand EZ reader, I believe, but they're based on the same hardware which is Hanlin V3.

[Spellbot 5000]

Interesting post, although I don't really see what you're getting at as no one is really arguing those points you brought up.

[GeoffC]

Originally Posted by Spellbot 5000

Interesting post, although I don't really see what you're getting at as no one is really arguing those points you brought up.

It is true that the OP has made the usual argument for the Gen 3, interesting some of the comments such as 8000 page turns seem as though it was pinched directly from the official bumf .....

Incidently no-one I've noticed here on MR has mentioned anything about termination of the Gen 3 - at least not without it being a tongue in cheek comment......

[gerraldo]

Originally Posted by GeoffC

It is true that the OP has made the usual argument for the Gen 3, interesting some of the comments such as 8000 page turns seem as though it was pinched directly from the official bumf .....

Incidently no-one I've noticed here on MR has mentioned anything about termination of the Gen 3 - at least not without it being a tongue in cheek comment......

Battery life seems to be a point with some different opinions... Compared to backlit devices it's excellent - everything else depends... (for me it's perfectly OK - lot of playing around at start and reading 4 books has brought it down to 50% + I often turn it on/off, using any free minute to read some pages)

BTW: With the Weltbild-CyBook they've changed advertised reading time first to "6000 pages" and later to "up to 10 books"!

I can understand pekefoschs comment, about his fear of the technology/platform dying before it spreads. There are lots of things going on at the moment:
- new eInk devices appearing everywhere
- ePub format pushed for DRM standard in Europe
- Kindle looking for Europe
- nextGen readers being developed (WiFi, touchscreen, backlight, color)
- NetBooks, NetTablets, MIDs, etc. being announced/appearing
- and so on...

My POV:
- On the long-term eInk devices/eBook readers will die away and readers on other devices will take over (said NetTablets, MIDs, smartphones etc.) - if there'll be ever those fuel cells available (with said 3-5 times battery life), this will even speed things up.
- If the DRM problem will not be solved soon (ONE de facto standard and/or no DRM at all, which I'd prefer) + reasonable pricing compared to pBooks (lower prices, budget eBooks, package deals, flat rates etc.), they'll have the same problems coming like the music biz.

[Idoine]

I don't think ereaders will disappear, IF their price decrease !
I have a TabletPC, and a Windows Mobile phone, and I bought my Cybook nonetheless, because I "needed" a bigger screen than my PDA's, and a lighter device than my TabletPC's !
If the ereaders market is growing now, I think it's exactly for these reasons.

[pekefosch]

@Idoine: I agree with you. That are almost exactly my thoughts, too.
@gerraldo: Dear gerraldo. Thanks for the kindly prospection of my posting. I don't really fearing about dying of a technology. That is life. I have seen that with Atari after Jack Tramiel died. GEM and TOS disappeared dissolving in Windows 3.1. That is no problem. My special POV is being lucky about the Cybook because of the following reasons. A family member of mine had a fusion of cervical spine that disabled head movement at all. So he cannot look down to a notebook screen, cannot read books on a "musical notes stand" because books are regularly too wide for viewing without head rotation, Smartphone and PDA devices are either to heavy or are exhausting. Mobipocket for Palm is convenient but reading much is not a relaxing thing. So the Cybook as much as some other 6" eInk readers are very fine and Cybook is very lightweight for this certain purpose.

I didn' want to accuse anybody for discussing the Cybook faults but before I bought it I did some Google searching (in German, as well as in English language) and found so many people telling they are unhappy with that device and since it is almost perfectly suitable for my needs I wanted to get a proper bias, you can call it loyalist marketing

My individual needs are:
* extremely lightweighted
* 5,5-7" display (bigger is not capable and lesser is not uncomfortable for our needs)

My wishes:
* color, searchable, on-demand-touchscreen, larger pagination buttons, sdhc compatibility, much better book index (sortable in metadata or filename and folder style browsing of books: at least like a gui ftp client), buttons with bigger size (such devices could conveniently help older people with bad visus), case with grips for better holding, TOC link feature with better selected-link-highlighting (e.g. inverse)

Any other reader would be fine, too. My intention is primarily promotion for disabled persons' use (rehabilitation care products are often unpayable (such as screen reader or braille systems or tts configurations)). So the Bookeen Cybook fits a certain niche and although it has not backlight nor perfect pdf support and almost no real customer information service it is relatively cheap and smart I had to write about my positive relation to it.

Thanks for discussion and god bless.

[vishcompany]

Originally Posted by gerraldo

- On the long-term eInk devices/eBook readers will die away and readers on other devices will take over (said NetTablets, MIDs, smartphones etc.) - if there'll be ever those fuel cells available (with said 3-5 times battery life), this will even speed things up.

I doubt, that eInk will disappear, as it is so much better on the eyes. I'm working a lot with backlit screens (office and a netbook for private purposes), which is tiresome. In comparison, I can read for hours on end and it just feels as good as reading from paper. Simply for this reason the technology has it's right to exist. Furthermore: Why using a screen which needs much power and power up the battery, if there is a perfectly energy saving screen, which looks even better? I don't want to read a book on a tablet PC, or Iphone or PDA. If I want to check email, I still can fire up my netbook.

[Abelturd]

Eink forevaaa!
If it's going to disappear then only to be replaced with something better, with more colors, better contrast, improved readability, less strain for the eyes.
Ebooks are the future, there's no way around it. So it doesn't really matter if eink as a technology will die, because the abovementioned attributes will always be pursued, along with ergonomic form factor suitable for comfortable reading experience (and now I'm not thinking smartphones).

[bwaldron]

Originally Posted by pekefosch

For some time I am owner of a Cybook Gen3. I am absolutely glad to have it!

Same here. I own (and like) a Kindle as well, but find that I spend more time reading on the Cybook due to the smaller size and font support.

Certainly it's not perfect -- and there are valid concerns about Bookeen as a company -- but all of the current devices (and companies behind them) have their pros and cons.

All things considered, the Gen3 is a fine device for reading Mobipocket books.

[gerraldo]

Dear all...

Please read carefully: "On the long-term eInk devices/eBook readers will die away...". And as Abelturd has noted: "then only to be replaced with something better".

I thought the topic to be of some interest for a wider audience and continued it HERE

[GeoffC]

Originally Posted by bwaldron

Same here. I own (and like) a Kindle as well, but find that I spend more time reading on the Cybook due to the smaller size and font support.

Certainly it's not perfect -- and there are valid concerns about Bookeen as a company -- but all of the current devices (and companies behind them) have their pros and cons.

All things considered, the Gen3 is a fine device for reading Mobipocket books.

as long as we can damn well get what we want to read ....